The FinInfluencer Battle

Influencing Specifically in the name of money is very easy. Let consider the retirement game played on by some very famous influencers. Everyone wants to be financially stable but are we really considering stopping working after reaching 40-50 years. This is like saying each engineer who passes out is a government employee. Things are different for everybody and it must be journey that should be planned and not the Destination. Lets us discuss this out with some skin in the game by a story

Let us Consider that Sharan Hegde 35, a salaried private sector employee.

Before we get started, let me establish some pointers:

• Most people at this age do not make 1.5 L PM, they average from 40K to 75K PM. The hyper-inflated IT salary paid by MNCs isn’t the norm.
• Some of them have a house (inherited), some don’t, and some, even worse, are stuck in the home loan EMIs trap from 10 to 30 years.
• Quite a lot of them are single earning parents, which means single income with responsibilities.
• Some of them might have children and adults in their care who have physical/mental health issues, which means financially speaking, their healthcare expenses will pinch a lot.
• Some of them might be paying off loans for the poor financial decisions made by their previous (most likely exorbitant jewel loans or some mortgages) , added financial responsibility fo extended family etc

Given all that, let’s get to the main issue - We do not get to retire. The earlier we accept it the better.

We cannot sit and make predictions and projections for ten years in the future. We can only look up to 2, maximum 5 years into the future and keep working towards that. That’s how it is - you either save up an impossibly huge corpus and retire or keep living as you do, gradually slowing down as you age.

There are many factors that has got us to this stage - the increased cost of living, inflation, government policies, employment difficulties - yes, they are there, but the question to be answered is - what do we do?

We do the best with what we can.

Choose a career doing something you love doing. This way, you will not feel the grind of work. You will have a healthy work-life integration, which helps you both work and live your life with satisfaction. Given that we do not get to retire, if we are to work for the next thirty years, might as well do something we like doing. Also, keep upskilling. If we are replaced at our jobs, we can find another job and learn to love that, and another, and another!

Keep your personal life as stress free as possible. No annoying relatives and friends - they are not worth it. Also, slowly building your social capital - we need people more than we think we need them. Trust me - a happy life is a healthy life. Also, be the person you want others to be to you. Don’t hesitate to volunteer in emergencies, help a student out with fees, be socially responsible, donate blood - do whatever you can and establish a good reputation. It will go a long way. How you are treated as an older person depends a lot on your attitude when you are in your youth.

Ensure your and your family’s health. Book regular tests and consultations, regular dental check-ups, eye check-ups, vaccinations, diet, exercise - just staying healthy is a great money saver. Keep an emergency fund just for medical emergencies - insurance won’t cover most of our ailments.

Ok, we established the baseline. How do we grow our money?

First, set aside a mandatory sum monthly for short-term recurring deposits and fixed deposits. They are NOT investments, but they lock your money and keep you from spending it. Once they mature, you can invest them however you want. Also, set aside a monthly sum for “celebrations” and stick to it. This includes birthdays, anniversaries, festivals, vacations, etc.

In Todays Age information is money. Dedicating 5 years towards learning a skill and building a small business which will reward you financially at the average of 100-500 USD a month is a great way to work towards retirement early

Have multiple life insurance, term insurance, SIPs, and mutual funds. Why multiple? We need to invest with what we have, the amount initially invested will not be much, and so the returns also will “not be much”. Hence, multiple. Physical gold in the form of coins act as a great emergency corpus (Sell the coin whenever you want the money).

With respect to loans - please try to minimize them as much as possible. No point in locking yourself in a long-term large seven figure home loan and literally giving up all your joy just to have a name board with your name - until you pay off the loan, the house isn’t yours. The bank will have zero hesitation in seizing it if you don’t pay regularly. In cities, owning a property with a long term loan is the same as paying a very costly rent to a bank-owned house. Gold loans - please don’t. It’s literally a financial black hole. Detach the sentiment from the object - you’ll save loads of money. However home becomes an investment when it s your first home. Buy a hourse to live with a space to park. Rest of the money that you are willing to spend on amenities is luxury and not a necessity

Now, the most important part - LIVE. Travel. Eat. Read. Experience life while you can. This isn’t an excuse to overspend - you have have a great life spending the bare minimum. You don’t need to slog all day only to blow it up on an overcompensation; have a sustained inflow-outflow. What I’m trying to say is, if we keep saving and investing every single penny for our elusive “retirement” without enjoying the now, and when you reach there you see you still aren’t there, you will regret it one hundred percent. You need to think of the future. You also need to live in the now.

We are a generation that is seeing a shifting goalpost - which means the system is rigged so that we might never make it to the top. We can let that bog us down. Or we can have a “everything can be eventually figure-out-able” attitude, and live happily.